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endlessjoe
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Joined: 2010/10/26
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University of Calabar Nigeria

 THEOLOGY OF JAMES': SEEING THROUGH HIS LENS...PT 19


TEXT: JAMES 1:18
" Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures."(KJV)

"God's Word God decided to give us life through the word of truth to make us his most important creatures."(GW)

"Good News By his own will he brought us into being through the word of truth, so that we should have first place among all his creatures."(GNB)

"He brought us to life using the true Word, showing us off as the crown of all his creatures "(MSG)

Of note and attention, are four cumulative issues in the text under consideration. These three issues are employed by James to further prove the "innocency" of God in contrast to the accusation against Him in vs 13. These four issues are the will of God; the word of truth; God's fatherhood; and the firstfruits of His creation.

We say these four things are cumulative because the order in which they are mentioned, if altered, would be dangerous in gaining access to divine truth. These four are dependent on each others: the will, the fatherhood; the truth and the firstfruits.

The will here is the will of God...it speaks of God's desires and His plan: what is pleasing to Him. So James says that God had a plan to give birth to us, making us brand new creature in Him, in order for us to be seen as His sons. This has been the plan of God since the fall of man. God intended to get for Himself a crop of men in which He can stamp His image and nature...He would have sons among men, who would look like Him in power, purity and wisdom. This was and still is His overriding will.

So of this will...by this free will...with an eye on this will, He gave birth to us in Christ Jesus by the WORD OF TRUTH. Watch this: in putting this will or desire into effect, He employed the WORD OF TRUTH. Anytime God wills a thing, He establishes same by His word. His will is to give us new birth, so that we can be a sample or firstfruits among His creatures.

So the instrument of birth is the WORD OF God. God does every thing through the instrumentality of His word. The agent of our conception in the womb of the divine will of God, is the WORD OF TRUTH...the gospel. God can never achieve anything here on earth except through His spoken word. Right from the word go, all that God does are done by His word. No matter how good Any of God's plans is, He can only establish it via His word.

The church would, therefore, do well if she gives full attention to the word of God above every other thing. As individuals, we must endeavour to open our ways, hearts and lives to the searching light of the word of God. God became a father by the WORD OF TRUTH: we became sons and daughters by the WORD OF TRUTH as well. The WORD OF TRUTH has God's nature and characteristic inherent in it: when it is sent forth, it carries the power and nature of God with it...whatever encounters it or whatever it encounters, it leaves the obvious mark of God's nature on that thing.

John, the beloved says, "whatesover is born of God, overcomes..." God is an overcomer: whatever or whoever He joins Himself with, also got rubbed off of that overcoming life which is inherent in God. So this word of truth is God and God is this word of truth...when we share the WORD OF God, we share the life of God to people. To be a minister of the WORD, simply means, administering or dispensing God Himself to our audience; for in the very beginning, the WORD, the logo, the thoughts, the collec tions of divine idea, was with God, He was God and God was Him. This word is God, simplicita!

Whoever He, therefore, gives birth to by this word, the same, inherently and potentially, shares in the very nature of God. Amen! No one born of God, via the WORD OF TRUTH, is weak and powerless! As God is so are all that are born of Him...Jesus cried, "ye are gods!" They are gods because they are born of the WORD OF TRUTH. Whatever characteristic can be attributed to the WORD OF God, can be attributed to those who are born of that word. Hallelujah!

Lets look at Peter's theology over this matter. Remember that Peter's audience is the same with James's : "Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,"(1Pet.1:1) and " James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greeting."(James1:1) respectively. The two epistles were written to the twelve tribes in diaspora.

So ,in 1 peter 1:23-25, which read thus:

"Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of
incorruptible, by the word of God, which
abideth for ever.For all flesh is as grass, and all
the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass
withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away:
But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this
is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you."

Here we see that the WORD is forever therefore, those who are born thereby, lives forever. Eternal life is imparted by the WORD because the WORD itself has eternal life. If the writer of Hebrews posits that the WORD OF God is "...is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." It means then that whoever is born of God shares these power and character.

We would never know the power of the new creation man until we see, by revelation, his source. This man is from above, kept by the power of God and taste on daily basis, the power of the world to come. Hallelujah! From the text in Hebrews, the new creation man, is a sword, sharper than the sharpest dagger, able to piece through joints and marrow and locating the dividing line between soul and spirit. This man is a judge...drawing lines between light and darkness; error and truth; and sin and righteousness. Paul in 1 cor. 2:15 says, "But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man."

Whatever the WORD OF God can do, this man is wired to do the same because he has God's Dunamis inside of him. For clarity and amplification of this point, lets look at the rendering of Hebrews 4:12, in the Amplified Bible:

"For the Word that God speaks is alive and full of power
[making it active, operative, energizing, and effective];
it is sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating to
the dividing line of the [7] breath of life (soul) and
[the immortal] spirit, and of joints and marrow [of the
deepest parts of our nature], exposing and sifting and
analyzing and judging the very thoughts and purposes
of the heart."

This is who God wills that whoever is born of the WORD OF truth should be. A man in honour and does not know he is, is like the beast that perishes. A man thus born from above, is not a mean man! When a man sees this, he would praise more and pray less but meaningfully! To be continued.


_________________
Emeka Joe Uzosike

 2014/5/7 2:29Profile





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